Passive Crossover are the weakest link in every
audio chain,
and only you can cast off your chains
Dr. Gizmo

This is a good opportunity for me to make the connection between emotions,
musical aesthetics and audio engineering...and how to improve the quality
of your speakers with a non-brainer modification...and I am not talking
about buying new speakers.

A FUNDAMENTAL EMOTIONAL TAUTOLOGY

This is a no brainer: passion compels intimacy. If you feel that strongly,
and by that I mean there is an inferno of pleasure burning in your soul....
for anyone or anything, you have a physical urge to be as close as possible
to the object of your desire, whether that is your lover. your motorcycle,
or music. This is called the urge to merge and every gifted listener,
like you, experiences it. Have you ever experienced an intense passion
and wanted to be far away from the desired one? Obviously not. So it is
with music. If we feel passionately about it, we want to be as intimate
as possible; to be as physically close to it as possible.

Now we stumble on one of the great paradoxes of human consciousness:
If we surrender to our passions, and are filled with this urge to merge,
it is most common for the savagery of our primal soul to emerge. Can anyone
of us repress the heat, the lust and greed of passion? There is nothing
sober or intelligent about the savagery of passion, and so it is with
music. If music is doing its job, we are loosing it...we are loosing all
of those armored body controls and slipping into an emotional savagery
of pleasure, and nothing feels better and freer than that. Just ask Stravinsky.

What makes audio technology such an important art form is that when it
is working properly it permits us to experience this passion, this emotional
savagery, in our living room...this intense desire for musical intimacy.

Let me state this metaphorically: If you want to run with the wolves
in your living room you must surrender to the most savage emotions, the
most primitive desires for musical intimacy...but as you grow and expand
in your musical sensitivity this may become increasingly difficult because
most gifted listeners, like you, are wearing rubbers....and you
know how hard it is to run with rubbers on.....just give this piece a
chance.

THE PRIESTS SECRET

Want a great example of audio absurdity? You spend thousands of dollars
on electronics, speakers and interconnects and all of your signal winds
of at a $3 inductor, and a $1 capacitor. And are you ready for this shock:
you spend zillions of dollars on state of the art electronics and interconnects,
and they are connected to...the longest wires in your system, which are
speaker inductors...and who pays attention to the quality of this hidden
wire?

All of those audio savant that are preaching about their circuit refinements
ignore the fact that the artistic destiny of their work is controlled
by a bunch of cheap parts in a speaker box. The solution?

As you know from my previous ranting I am on a sacred mission to compel
all Priests of the Temple of Monkey Coffins to make all of their passive
crossovers external to their speakers. Why is this crusade so compelling?
Because your passive crossovers are the rubbers you are wearing...they
are preventing you from running with the wolves. They are inhibit the
ultimate sensation of musical intimacy.

Accomplishing this simple task, which requires no research or development,
will catapult the potential quality, meaning intimacy, of all loudspeakers,
because once those nasty passive crossovers are out there in the open,
either (1) the manufacturer will be forced to make them with higher quality
parts or (2) you will have the options of retrofitting them with higher
quality parts. In other words, by simple act of not hiding those crossovers
inside the monkey coffin, your options have expanded.

Let me remind you of what every Priest knows, but doesnt want to
tell: the further these passive crossovers are from the drivers the better
their electrical performance.

Why do all passive crossovers sing? Are they happy or are they
exhibiting the universal electro-mechanical resonances that Mike VansEvers
refers to? Doubt my words? Buy a cheap stethoscope and listen to your
speakers capacitors and inductors sing along with the music. This
is not a good thing and why so many Japanese audiomaniacs, and yours truly,
have buried their passive crossovers in sandboxes, or packed them in modeling
clay.

Lets take a pause now, and light up a cigar. While you are puffing
and expanding your gizmological metacontext, and as your courage expands
concentrate on my intent: I am asserting that your speakers are much better
than you imagined, or to put it another way: the quality of midrange drivers,
in general, have outpaced the quality of passive crossovers, so
before you consider buying a new pair of speakers, consider upgrading
the parts quality of your passive crossover.

Are you still puffing? Coagulate on this: being that the midrange tonality
is the most important single element of your music epiphany we want to
do everything in our power to maximize it. Because you are the not
normal audiophile victim (which is a redundancy); because you are
an audiomaniac, you can take control of tonal destiny, you are not afraid
of using a screw driver and soldering iron, especially because we are
not dealing with any voltages here...no voltage, no shocks possible. If
you only have one hand, lost your hands in an accident or war, or are
still terrified of soldering irons, then enlist the help of your neighborhood
audio nerd. Once you get the new crossover parts, fair compensation for
this work should be about $25-50, and can be done right in your home.

Those of you who have spiritually advanced and are listening to directly
heated triode amps should pay attention to what I am saying because there
is only one way to experience the fundamental harmonic wholosity of these
tubes...you have to lift your crossover fog.

You will also note how many $20K+ speakers boast using AlphaCore foil
inductors.

Let me assure you from my personal experience that if you are into directly
heated triode amplifiers, which is the celebration of King Tone, upgrading
your crossovers is a major advancement in your aural matrix.

HOW TO TAKE OFF YOUR RUBBERS

(1) Call up your speakers designers and discover if he will cooperate
in your adventure. Will he give you the specifications on the inductors
used in his speaker? If he tells you that foil inductors wont make a difference...well,
he may be right...his speakers may be so poorly designed that you cant
hear the big electrical superiority of foil inductors. If he hems and
haws, it is probably because he is embarrassed, which he shouldnt
be. These inductors are much more expensive than normal inductors
and would make the selling price of your speakers much higher...and not
everyone is a gifted listener, like you, who demands more.

(2) Order a copy of Speaker Builder, published by Ed Dell (603-924-9464)
and check out all of the different companies that make very high quality
speaker crossover capacitors. I will soon do an evaluation of some of
these brands and let you know the results. These caps will
not be cheap, but they are worth it. Most high quality speakers have generic
polypropylene capacitors and the superbrands are superior.
Michael Percey Audio (415-669-7181) is an excellent source for ordering
these capacitors. Madisound (608-831-3433) is also a prime supplier
of high quality crossover parts

(3) Replace your existing binding post with Edison Price beryllium copper
posts available from Eminent Technology (904-575-5655)...they are unplated.
You will hear the difference between plated brass and pure copper...and
yes solid silver would be better, but that is my next project.

(4) If you can, change the wire that goes from the speaker terminals
to the crossovers. If you can afford it, use AlphaCore silver foil, or
the best quality silver wire you can afford. At the very least use the
AlphaCore copper foil.

(5) Does your speaker have its crossovers on a printed circuit board?
Hard wire all of the passive crossover parts, and eliminate the printed
circuit board? This will also be a big improvement.

(6) Mount your crossover externally. Put them in a sand filled box, and
or pack them in modeling clay or Mortite.

(7) Sit back, light up a Cohiba cigar and enjoy the expansion of your
aural matrix.

THE ALPHA CORE FOIL INDUCTOR PITCH

When I use passive crossovers, I use crossovers that I have made with
AlphaCore foil inductors. Even my $30K Tannoy Westminster Royals came
stock with $10 inductors, which I immediately changed , and the process
took about ten minutes. I also use AlphaCore Inductors with my Sunlight
Engineering 308 drivers, because they deserve them. The AlphaCore silver
foil inductors, obviously, sound better, just like their silver foil cables
sound better than their coppers, but there is no doubt that their copper
foils are better than conventional enameled copper wire inductors.

A HAMMERESQUE CLOSING

So let me hit your over the head with a triode hammer: you spend thousands
of dollars on your electronics, tubes and speakers. You spend hundreds
of hours comparing the sound of different coupling capacitors...and a
$3 inductor is controlling your tonal destiny. Do you like listening to
the different tone of different brands of 300Bs? Not possible if your
passive crossovers are fogging up your midrange. Do you get my drift about
the silliness of letting your passive crossovers, which are the weakest
link in every system be NOT under your control?

You now know what to do...do as I do...do as every speaker designer does
who cares enough to give the very best...